CHAPTER XXIII
NOTES ON THE OMEN ANIMALS OF SARAWAK
The cult of the omen animals is of such importance in the daily life of most of the tribes of Borneo that it is desirable that more attention should be paid to it by those who have the opportunity of studying it at first hand.
The Ven. Archdeacon J. Perham has given a full account of the Sea Dayak religion in the Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 8), which has been reprinted by Ling Roth in his book, The Natives of Sarawak and British North Borneo. Mr. Ling Roth has also compiled some other scattered references on omens (vol. i. pp. 221-31). Although the following notes are very imperfect, they contain some new facts derived from Hose, and also, thanks to information derived from Hose, I am able for the first time to give a fairly complete list of the omen animals of Sarawak with their scientific names.
I have taken the liberty of abstracting the following account of the way in which birds are “used,” as the Iban (Sea Dayak) say, from Archdeacon Perham’s most valuable papers, as it is the best description known to me of what is of daily occurrence in Borneo.
“The yearly rice-farming is a matter of much ceremony as well as of labour with the Dayaks, and must be inaugurated with proper omens. Some man who is successful with his padi will be the augur, and undertake to obtain omens for a certain area of land, which others besides himself will farm. Some time before the Pleiades are sufficiently high above the horizon to warrant the clearing the grounds of jungle or grass, the man sets about his work. He will have to hear the nendak (Cittocincla suavis) on the left, the katupong (Sasia abnormis) on the left, the burong malam (a locust) and the beragai (Harpactes duvauceli) on the left, and in the order I have written them. As soon as he has heard the nendak he will break off a twig of anything near, and take it home and put it in a safe place. But it may happen that some other omen bird, or creature, is the first to make itself heard or seen; and in that case the day’s proceeding is vitiated. He must give the matter up, return, and try his chance another day; and thus sometimes three or four days are gone before he has obtained his first omen. When he has heard the nendak, he will then go to listen for the katupong and the rest, but with the same liability to delays; and it may possibly require a month to obtain all those augural predictions which are to give them confidence in the result of their labours. The augur has now the same number of twigs and sticks as birds he has heard, and he takes these to the land selected for farming, and puts them in the ground, says a short form of address to the birds and Pulang Gana (the tutelary deity of the soil, and the spirit presiding over the whole work of rice-farming), cuts a little grass or jungle, and returns. The magic virtue of the birds has been conveyed to the land.
“For house-building, the same birds are to be obtained, and in the same way. But for a war expedition birds on the right hand are required, except the nendak, which, if it make a certain peculiar call, can be admitted on the left.
“These birds can be bad omens as well as good. If heard on the wrong side, if in wrong order, if the note or call be the wrong kind, the matter in hand must be postponed or abandoned altogether; unless a conjunction of subsequent good omens occur, which, in the judgment of old experts, can overbear the preceding bad ones. Hence, in practice, this birding becomes a most involved matter, because the birds will not allow themselves to be heard in a straightforward orthodox succession. After all it is only a balance of probabilities, for it is seldom that Dayak patience is equal to waiting till the omens occur according to the standard theory.
“These are the inaugurating omens sought in order to strike a line of good luck, to render the commencement of an undertaking auspicious. The continuance of good fortune must be carried on by omen influence to the end.
“When any of these omens, either of bird, beast, or insect, are heard or seen by the Dayak on his way to the padi lands, he supposes they foretell either good or ill to himself or to the farm; and in most cases he will turn back and wait for the following day before proceeding again. The nendak is generally good, so is the katupong on the right or left, but the papau (Harpactes diardi) is of evil omen, and the man must beat a retreat. A beragai heard once or twice matters not, but if often, a day’s rest is necessary. The mbuas (Carcineutes melanops) on the right is wrong, and sometimes it portends so much blight and destruction that the victim must rest five days. The ‘shout’ of the kutok (Lepocestes porphyromelas) is evil, and that of the katupong so bad that it requires three days’ absence from the farm to allow the evil to pass away; and even then a beragai must be heard before commencing work. The beragai is a doctor among birds. If the cry of a deer, a pelandok (Tragulus) be heard, or if a rat crosses the path before you on your way to the farm, a day’s rest is necessary, or you will cut yourself, get ill, or suffer by failure of the crop. When a good omen is heard, one which is supposed to foretell a plentiful harvest, you must go on to the farm, and do some trifling work by way of ‘leasing the work of your hands’ there, and then return; in this way you clench the foreshadowed luck, and at the same time reverence the spirit which promises it. And should a deer or pelandok come out of the jungle and on to the farm when you are working there, it means that customers will come to buy the corn, and that therefore there will be corn for them to buy. This is the best omen they can have, and they honour it by resting from work for three days.